Speaker unverified: belief

Transcript context

…I think that, historically, I think that the big issue is I think that both sides have had their own internal motivations to fight because they feel like they have something to gain from it. But I think as time has gone on, unfortunately, the record proves that the Palestinian side is delusional. The longer that the conflict endures, the worse position they’ll be in. But for some reason, they’ve never had a leader that convinced them of that as much, that Arafat thought that if he held on, there was always a better deal around the corner, that Abbas is more concerned with trying to maintain any legitimacy amongst Palestinians than actually trying to negotiate anything realistic with Israel, that Palestinians are always incentivized to feel like as long as they keep fighting, either the international community is going to save them with the 5 millionth UN resolution condemning whatever, that another ICJ advisory opinion is finally going to lead to the expulsion of half a million Jews from the West Bank, or that some other international body, the ICJ and the genocide charge, is going to come and save the Palestinians. As long as they, in their mind, feel like somebody is coming to save them, then they feel like they’re going to have the ability to get something better in the future. But the reality is all of the good partners for peace that the Palestinians had have completely and utterly abandoned them; Egypt, Jordan, the Gulf states. Whether you’re talking bilateral peace or the Abraham Accords, most of the Arab leaders, in negotiating peace with Israel, have just not had as much of an interest in maintaining the rights and the representations of what the Palestinian people want. And the only people they have today to draw legitimacy from or to have on their side to argue with them are people that, I guess, write books or tweet or people in the international community that do resolutions or Amnesty International reports. And the reality is, we can scream until we’re blue in the face on these things, none of it has gotten any closer to helping the Palestinians in any sense of the word. The condition has only gotten worse. The settlements only continue to expand. The military operations are only to get more brutal. The blockade is going to continue to have worse effects. As long as we use international law as the basis and there isn’t a strong Sadat-like Palestinian leader that’s willing to come up and confront Israel with the brave, peaceful negotiations to force them to acquiesce, nothing is going to happen. And I think that the issue you come up with is, whether it’s people like Norm that talk about how brave the October 7th attacks were or how much respect they have for those fighters, Israel, in a way… And I think people have said as much about Netanyahu. The right wants violence from the Palestinians because it always gives them a perpetual excuse to further the conflict. ighters, Israel, in a way… And I think people have said as much about Netanyahu. The right wants violence from the Palestinians because it always gives them a perpetual excuse to further the conflict. “Well, we have to go in on October 7th and we’ve got to remove Hamas. Well, we can’t trust these people in the West. We have to do the night raids because the Second Intifada made us feel like the Palestinian people didn’t want trust with us. ” I feel like the biggest thing that would force Israel to change its path would be an actual, a real… not for two weeks, but an actual peaceful Palestinian leader, somebody committed to peace, that is able to apply those standards and hold the entire region of Palestine to those standards. Because I think, over time, the mounting pressure from without the international community and the mounting pressure from within because Israel hosts a lot of its own criticism, if we talk about B’Tselem, we talk about Haaretz, Israel will host a lot of its own criticism. I think that that pressure would force Israel towards an actual peace agreement, but it’s never going to come through violence. Historically, it hasn’t. And in the modern day, violence has just hurt the Palestinians more and more. If you paint a picture of the future, now is a good moment for both Palestine and Israel to get new leadership. Netanyahu’s on the way out, Hamas possibly is on the way out. Who should rise to the top such that a peaceful settlement can be reached? And I’d love to [inaudible 04:16:33].…

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